The mystery behind it all
by Fire-Shadow-Ice
Summary: Naruto is alive somewhere.. but only Sasuke knows where... he is being verry kind to Sakura, is it a trap or his true feelings?


She couldn't believer her eyes, right infront of her was the dead bodies of; Orochimaru, Ino, Chouji, Tsunade and all the members of the Akatsuki. It was an A-ranked mission, and only a few had survived. It was like a huge graveyard, just without the graves. In every direction she looked, there was always blood and dead ninjas.

Naruto had gone missing a week before this mission, and nothing had been heard of him. For all she knew… he could be dead.

She collapsed to the floor and put her head in her hands, he pink hair came out of the bun and came half way down her back. It had been three years since she cut it to save Sasuke and Naruto at the Chunin exams.

"Sakura…" a low voice said from behind her. She knew exactly who it was because the voice had no emotion in it. She also knew that the owner of the voice had been trained by Orochimaru and he could take her out in one move. She didn't care if he killed her as she thought that she had nothing to live for.

"Sakura…" the voice repeated, but this time a hint of sadness was found.

"What do you want?" she asked, "If you want my love, you've already had it, same with my friendship. The only thing that you'll want from me is my life… have it if you want… kill me now!" She stood up and spun around to meet Sasuke's face, but it wasn't what she expected.

"Sakura… I want you to leave this place. I will find Naruto and bring him back to the Konoha village," there was a quiver in his voice as he spoke, and tears were starting to form in his eyes.

_Is this the real Sasuke?_ she asked herself, _he's never been like this, even when he tried to kill Naruto… there has got to be someone dead here, who is important to him_.

"This isn't like you…" she took a step away from him, "where is the real Sasuke?"

He took a step towards her, and she immediately got into a fighting stance.

"It's me!… just go back to the Konoha village, and let someone know what has happened and make sure that they get a new Hokage." He turned away and started to walk, but after five steps… he stopped, and said, "I've changed since I've been with Orochimaru, and next time to question me… I will kill you," he carried on walking, heading towards the sound village. Sakura noticed that when he said that he would kill her, he said it as though she was family and he really didn't want to even hurt her.

She watched Sasuke's figure slowly disappear in the distance.

_He isn't normally like that, he's right… he has changed, but I'm not sure whether it's for the better… or worse._ She thought to herself as she started walking towards the Konoha village.

When she got back, it was as though someone had already told them… _Shikamaru_, she considered as he was the only one that she knew of, that had come back to the village.

She glanced around, looking for Shikamaru, but she couldn't see any shinobis.

"If you're looking for Shikamaru, he's in the Hokage's old room."

Sakura quickly spun around to find Neji, who was lent on a wall, about a meter away form here and he was staring at her.

"I didn't know that you had survived, and where are the other shinobis?" she asked, curious to why he was staring at her, but she didn't dare to ask him.

"Well you don't sound too pleased about me being alive, but the other shinobis are either dead or they haven't arrived returned yet…" he stopped staring at her and decided to stare at the sky instead.

"I think it's brilliant that you're alive, but… I don't know why I don't feel happy… it's as though someone has taken all my emotions," she looked at her hands and noticed that they were all covered in blood.

"Hey…"came Neji's voice, "we should get you to the hospital."

She quickly looked up, _why would I need to go to the hospital? I haven't even been fighting_… she thought to herself.

Neji grabbed her wrist and led her towards the hospital, neither of them said a word until they got there.

When they arrived at the hospital the nurses took a quick look at Sakura, gasped then ran over to help her. She didn't know what was going on, but after a few minutes of being stood there, everything around her went black. She felt arms catch her before she hit the floor, but anything that happened after that… she couldn't remember.

She woke up a week later, she quickly scanned the room, it was a hospital room. She sat up not realising why she was in hospital, but she soon found out. As she sat up, a sharp pain ran down her back, she then felt a bandage that went around her back and stomach. She laid back down because she couldn't stand the pain, but she was still curious to how she got the injury.

"Glad to see you're awake," she recognised Shikamaru's voice, but didn't dare to look at him. "Hey are you alright?" he asked, sounding a little bit concerned.

"I'm fine… do you know what happened to me?" she asked with no emotion in her voice, then she turned her head to face him.

There were bandages on his left arm and around his head, the rest of his body was covered in; cuts, scratches and bruises.

"No sorry… when I left you, all I saw was you walking through the battle field, but you was fine," he replied.

"Oh… ok," it was a short answer, but she didn't care… _this must be how Sasuke feels, no emotions and you don't even care what people say or do_, she said inside her head.

"Well I'm going," Shikamaru turned to go but stopped, and said, "Oh and by the way… just because Sasuke isn't here, doesn't mean that you have to act like him," he then carried on walking and left Sakura on her own.

Those words he said kept repeating themselves in her head, and it also made her think… _am I really becoming like Sasuke?_

An hour passed, then two and Sakura was still lying in her bead, thinking about what had happened. She had hundreds of questions that he was asking herself over and over. _Where is Naruto? Why did Sasuke look upset? Where is Sasuke now? Why am I becoming like Sasuke? Why am I in hospital? Who did this to me? _

The list of questions went on forever. She didn't realise the time, but when a nurse entered the room, Sakura quickly sat up, forgetting about her back and screamed with pain.

"You can't make any sudden movements Miss Haruno," the nurse said as she gave Sakura some medicine.

"When will I be able to get out of this place?" Sakura asked after taking the medicine, which she nearly threw up from because it was awful.

"Sorry dear, you wont be able to leave hospital until Friday, it's only Monday today," the nurse replied as she left the room, leaving Sakura yet again… alone.

The five days passed quickly, at dinner a nurse came into Sakura's room and said that she may leave. Sakura gathered all her belongings, placed them into a bag, then left the hospital.

On the way back to her place, Shikamaru stopped her.

"Shikamaru… I'm sorry… for being like Sasuke, I'm sorry for being so useless and I'm sorry for what happened."

Shikamaru looked at her, confused about what she had just said, "Um… I'm here because there is a shinobi meeting, the Kazekage is also there. What happened the other week is not your fault and I'm sorry for saying that you was like Sasuke, I didn't realise what you was going through… and I still don't, but anyways… will you come to the meeting please?"

She nodded he head in agreement, and they set off towards the Hokage's old room.

When they got there, Sakura was amazed by how many was there. Two sand ninjas: Tamari and Konkurou, as well as the Kazekage, who was Gaara.


End file.
